Page 52 of Traitor

She shook her head. “Messy—why do all the kids want to look messy? You have been at work, not the bed all day.”

Torch shot me a sympathetic look and I knew that he’d probably been on the receiving end of it since she arrived. “Look,Abuelita.Why don’t you and Torch finish up here. I’m just going to change out of my work clothes.”

Without waiting for a response, I walked down the hall to my room, hearing her call out after me. “His name is Dave. He is not a torch.”

I closed the door and leaned against it, tempted to call Josué and tell him that his mother was going to drive meloco. I pulled my shirt off and threw it onto a bed that was no longer unmade.Abuelitahad been busy.

My dress pants came off next and quickly joined my shirt on the bed as I pondered what to wear. I usually just threw on some cotton shorts and a tank top, but withAbuelitahere, that would not fly.

I finally settled on a black sundress with cherries on it and laid it across my bed on my way into the small bathroom connected to my room. I fussed with my hair in the mirror, not seeing a problem, before sitting down to pee. That was when I saw it.

Blood.

I’d gotten my period.

My face crumpled with despair. I didn’t know why I was reacting like this. I should’ve been relieved—a baby was a complication that I didn’t need at this point in my life. I’d had a little over a week to grow used to the idea though and now it had been ripped from me…just like everything else.

My tears became full-on sobbing and I buried my face in my hands. I’d known that we couldn’t make it work, but a baby would’ve been the part of him I could hold on to. The part of him left untainted by the world.

There was a knock on the bedroom door. “Lauren? Are you okay?”

I took a deep breath. “I’m fine,Abuelita. Just give me a minute.”

Ignoring me, she entered the bedroom. The bathroom door opened up next and she slipped inside, taking in the fact that I was sitting on the toilet, sobbing hysterically.

“Mijita, what has happened?”

It took me a couple of tries, but I finally managed to get out, “I got my period.”

I expected questions or even worse, reprimands. Instead, she found a washcloth and ran it under the faucet until the water grew warm. Then she came over and began rubbing it gently across my face.

“When I was young, I think that I will have a big family. YourAbuelo—God rest his soul—and I married and I thought this was my chance. It was not so simple though. Each month was another reminder that my body wasdefectuoso.” She paused and looked away.

I swallowed around another sob and admitted, “He broke my heart, but when I found out that I was late, I thought that maybe there were worse things than carrying his baby.”

She patted my knee. “You will carry a child, Lauren. I tried for years and one day, the Lord saw fit to give me my Josué.”

My eyes were swollen and my nose was running like a faucet, butAbuelitastayed by my side, wiping away the tears and snot.

“I don’t want to just carry a child, I want to carry his child. How messed up is that? He refused to help me get Monica out of jail. Then, I told him when I planned to go into the station and my car got blown up. In what world do we ever work?”

She cupped my chin in her hand. “Do not be so quick to close his chapter,Mijita. I got my miracle. Things can work out—sí Dios nos da licencia.”

I didn’t know what the last part meant, but I nodded anyway. “It hurts—I’ve had this crushing weight on my chest since January. And I don’t know how much longer I can take it.”

She squeezed the washcloth out and ran it under warm water again. “No hay mal que dure cien años, ni cuerpo que lo soporte.Do you know what that means?”

I shook my head.

“It means that nothing bad lasts forever, and even if it did, you would not be able to withstand it anyway. That makes you feel better, right?”

It didn’t in the slightest, but I was certain that she’d made tamales andsofritoand I didn’t want to be left out of that, so I nodded as if it did.

She ran the warm cloth over my face again. “That’s a good girl. I am going to help Dave with dinner while you get freshened up. I brought my hot water bottle—you can use it for the cramping.”

I sniffled again. “Thank you,Abuelita.”

She pressed a kiss to the top of my head. “Maybe fix your hair a little before you come out too.” She squeezed my cheek. “We’ve got to fatten you up, LoLo. You are nothing but skin and bones. You do not want to loselas montañas.”

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